Trump: Joe Lieberman is top contender for new FBI director

Former Senator Joe Lieberman waves as he leaves after a meeting with President Donald Trump for candidates for FBI director at the White House.

By Ashley Parker, Washington Post •May 18, 2017 4:52 pm

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump said Thursday that Joe Lieberman was his top choice to become FBI director, filling the slot left open after Trump fired James Comey, his previous FBI head, last week.

Trump, speaking to a group of television anchors at the White House Thursday afternoon, said that Lieberman, the former senator from Connecticut and Democratic vice presidential nominee, was his leading candidate to run the agency.

The president also told the group that he was close to a decision, an assertion he repeated later at a joint appearance with President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia.

“We’re very close to an FBI director,” Trump told reporters as he posed for photos with Santos in the Oval Office, saying his choice would be announced “soon.”

Some senators on Capitol Hill Thursday were already expressing skepticism Thursday about choosing a politician to lead the independent investigations bureau.

Lieberman, originally a Democrat and later an independent, was not always Trump’s top pick, either. Previously, the president had expressed interest in Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, R-Texas, for the post. Cornyn took himself out of the running, saying he believed he could best serve the president by remaining in the Senate.